Leadership quality trade-off and vote buying: Evidence from the world’s third largest democracy

Behavioural intervention: We randomly assign informational treatments. In the treatment condition, respondents watch an educational animated video explaining the accountability conception of democracy using a metaphor easy to grasp for a layperson. In one control condition, neutral information about general election eligibility and procedures is provided, in a visual format identical to the treatment video. In a second control condition, respondents do not watch any video.

Measurement intervention: Apart from the behavioral intervention above, we use different methods to experimentally measure the outcomes of interest. First, to measure preferences regarding leadership quality, we are using a conjoint experiment. In this experiment, respondents choose between fifteen pairs of fully randomized hypothetical legislative candidate profiles. Demographic characteristics, identities (religion and ethnicity), valence, and position on divisive issues are randomly assigned to profiles.

Second, we are using list experiment to measure the prevalence of vote buying during the campaign period as well as during the actual election. In list experiment, respondents are asked to state the number of activities they see or experienced from the list we provide them. The experiment randomly vary the number of activities listed for different group. The list given to the control and the treatment group are exactly similar except that the treatment group will also receive a sensitive item in their list (vote buying activities). The magnitude of vote buying is measured by comparing the average number of values stated in the treatment and the control group.

(Previously hidden details of intervention): The explain the accountability conception of democratic election, we use a metaphor of a person who inherit a convenient store from his grandparents but then need to hire someone else to manage the store. Store manager will run the store on behalf of the owner, and hence act as an agent for the principal (store owner). This type of principal-agent relationship is how, we try to convince the respondents, we suppose to look at the relationship between voters and their representatives in the legislative body.

The explain the accountability conception of democratic election, we use a metaphor of a person who inherit a convenient store from his grandparents but then need to hire someone else to manage the store. Store manager will run the store on behalf of the owner, and hence act as an agent for the principal (store owner). This type of principal-agent relationship is how, we try to convince the respondents, we suppose to look at the relationship between voters and their representatives in the legislative body.

2024-01-25

2024-02-07

Weight assigned to different characteristics of hypothetical candidates
The magnitude of vote buying

- Weight assigned to different characteristics of hypothetical candidates : Will be calculated using two methods. First is ACME method (Hainmueller, Hopkins, and Yamamoto, 2014) and second using Random Utility estimation.

-The magnitude of vote buying is estimated by calculating the average value of number elicited by the respondents on different list of activities.


A more detailed elaboration of each method is include in the Pre-Analysis plan document.

Incumbent family advantage
Voter Turnout

See PAP. Incumbent dynastic advantage is measured by vote intention for the challenger ticket that includes the son of the incumbent president as vice-presidential candidate.
Turnout is self-reported in the post-election wave.

From the pool sample of respondents collected in the baseline (wave 1), the treatment is assigned as follows:

- Wave 2 (Pre-election survey): 2700 respondents will be assigned to the conjoint experiment, while the rest--900 respondents will be assigned to the list experiment. Half of respondents in each experiment will be assigned to the treatment video, while the other half will be assigned to the control video (1800 respondents in total in each treatment)

Wave 3 (Post-election survey): 2700 respondents who were previously assigned to the conjoint experiment will receive the list experiment in this wave. Unlike the pre-election list experiment, this experiment will have three treatment arms: control, treatment 1, and treatment 2. Meanwhile, 900 respondents who were previously assigned to the list experiment will receive the conjoint experiment in this wave. There will be no additional video treatment in this wave, the effect will rely of the treatment the respondents received in the previous wave (pre-election survey)

Randomization done in office by a computer

Individual

No

No cluster is applied in this trial

We plan to target 3600 respondents at the end of the third wave survey, but the actual number will depend on several aspect: - The number of responses collected in the baseline - The rate of attrition from one wave to another

Conjoint experiment : 1800 treatment, 1800 control (of which 900 video controls and 900 no video)
List experiment : 1800 treatment, 1800 control (of which 900 video controls and 900 no video)

Since previous studies in the context and method we are using are limited, we do not have a clear benchmark to calculate the minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes.

Indonesia General Election Survey Experiment: PAP